Official MLBlog of Keith Olbermann

Aaron And Gibson Lefthanded, and The Wrong A-Rod (Revised)

Hank Aaron’s appearance this week on The Late Show With David Letterman not only brought as hearty a series of laughs from baseball’s real all-time homer champ as I’ve ever heard him produce, but it also added one of those delightful footnotes to history. Letterman claimed that the day Aaron homered off Jack Billingham of the Reds to tie Babe Ruth’s mark of 714 at Riverfront Stadium in 1974, he was in the crowd. There’s no reason to doubt it: that was the year between Letterman’s career as a tv weatherman and the start of his comedy writing and performing.

Hank was there to provide the briefest of plugs for Topps’ celebration of its 60th year in baseball cards (he presented Letterman with a one-of-a-kind card in the style of the 2011 set, complete with a diamond in it – 60th being the ‘Diamond Anniversary’). For the sake of disclosure, Topps is paying Mr. Aaron to do the publicity, and for the sake of further disclosure, I’m an unpaid consultant for Topps as well.

They did not discuss two of Aaron’s more interesting cards. Obviously the portrait on the 1956 card here is the young Henry. But who is that sliding into the plate, an “M” on his cap and nothing on his uniform?Correct. It’s Willie Mays sliding home, his uniform doctored to kind of look like a Braves’ jersey. There’s no special value to that mistake, because they never corrected it. In fact I don’t know if it’s considered a mistake – I think “fudge” is a better term.

The 1957 edition, meanwhile, is a beautiful thing and NBH (Nothing But Hank)…but as the old cliche goes: what’s wrong with this picture?

Yes, 1957 was Topps’ first year working with their own full color photographs, and when scanned the printing often leaves much to be desired. But of course the problem here is, Hank never hit lefthanded. This is not like the 1959 card of Aaron’s teammate righthanded pitcher Lew Burdette, who posed as a southpaw for a joke at the photographer’s expense, nor like later tricks attempted by Bob Uecker and Gene Freese (successful), and Jim Brewer, Bob Gibson and Tom Seaver (caught in time). In the case of Aaron, Topps simply reversed the negative, as the backwards “4” on the left side of the uniform confirms.

The “Lefty Gibson” card is seldom seen and thus reproduced here in full:If you can imagine this, Topps prepped its first series of 1968 cards in the winter of ’67-68 and not only did Gibson succeed in this stunt, but so did Seaver, who had tried it while posing for his very first card.

Each got all the way to the printer’s proofs level – just a handful of sheets printed. Then the Topps Copy Editor had his apoplectic attack and replaced both the Gibson and Seaver lefthanded pitching poses with nice tight portraits.

One of Topps’ most famous photo goofs is shown at the left. This is the 1969 card of the “original” A-Rod, the late brilliant defensive third baseman, Aurelio Rodriguez. It’s a great photo, but it’s not Aurelio Rodriguez. It’s Leonard Garcia, a rather mature-looking Angels’ batboy from 1968.

For years Topps has taken the rap for the mistake – there have even been understandable suggestions of an ethnic slur implied by the screw-up. In fact, it wasn’t entirely the company’s fault. In the winter of 1967-68, the newly-powerful Baseball Players Association was squeezing Topps into dealing with it, rather than on a player-by-player basis. Topps, which theretofore had been able to sign guys for a down payment as low as a dollar, resisted. The MLBPA promptly forbade its members for posing for Topps during Spring Training, and in fact throughout the entire regular season, of 1968.

Thus, guys who changed teams in ’68 or the ’68-69 off-season are shown hatless in old photographs in the first few series of the 1969 set. But 1968’s rookies for whom Topps had no photo? It had to get them in the minor leagues (the Topps files were filled with photos of nearly every Triple-A player in 1968), or buy shots from outside suppliers. At least a dozen images in the ’69 set, including Reggie Jackson and Earl Weaver – and “Aurelio Rodriguez” – were purchased from the files of the famous Chicago photographer George Brace. Somebody at Topps should’ve known, but the original Rodriguez/Garcia goof appears to have been Brace’s.

Incidentally, eight years later Garcia got his own card under his own name, in the Cramer Sports Pacific Coast League Series. By this point he was the trainer of the Angels’ AAA team in Salt Lake City. The biography on the back makes reference to the 1969 Topps/Brace slipup.

9 Comments

Love reading your blog Keith. I am from Ga. so I am a huge Braves fan. Looking forward to your new show.I haven’t watched MSNBC since you left but I have to admit I do miss Ms. Maddow. Next to you she is the best!

So much for the baseball, politics and what was the other thing that one is not supposed to discuss…
Anyway, felt devastated by your departure, but understood given my readings of Bagdikian sp?, Chomsky and Herbert Schiller and what I believe was your need to be more than a stenographer to power in a shrinking media universe. Baseball is great and your irreverence and humor make it so much sweeter. Look forward to more good things to come. Best of luck!!

So much for the baseball, politics and what was the other thing that one is not supposed to discuss…
Anyway, felt devastated by your departure, but understood given my readings of Bagdikian sp?, Chomsky and Herbert Schiller and what I believe was your need to be more than a stenographer to power in a shrinking media universe. Baseball is great and your irreverence and humor make it so much sweeter. Look forward to more good things to come. Best of luck!!

Love reading your blog Keith. I am from Ga. so I am a huge Braves fan. Looking forward to your new show.I haven’t watched MSNBC since you left but I have to admit I do miss Ms. Maddow. Next to you she is the best!

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